#if i had a nickel for every time Sam brought a horse in here and Andie McDowell deserved it more than him i'd have 2 nickels

[soup-or-who-lock]

My dream for season 3 of The Way Home is simply that Sam goes away forever (because he is boring to me and I am sick of him) and Del gets TWO horses instead of one

[ursulaismymiddlename]

My new uniform makes me look/feel like someone right out of the 1940's and now all I can imagine is Bucky coming into the restaurant everyday at the same time and flirting with the shy (and rather cute in his opinion) waitress but never ordering anything and she gets really annoyed but flustered and all the older women there are encouraging it as well as betting on when she'll crack, a little teasing on their part is involved as well ;)

Okay, I only have one minor adjustment to make to this beautiful beautiful headcanon, and it’s that no one, no one, especially in the 40s, would’ve let him stay sitting there for very long without ordering something.

And thus is born Bucky Barnes’ love for shitty, thick as tar, black sludge masquerading as coffee.

Just about everyday, or at least every shift you worked, like clockwork, there strode in probably one of the single most handsome men she’d ever seen in her entire life - and she were counting the films she’d seen at the cinema, because holy cannoli was he beautiful.  And he’d park himself in her section, whether at the counter or a table or a booth, slap down a nickel and a smile so bright she thought sure she’d tan inside the diner, and ask for a cup of coffee.

And that’s it. A nickel cup of coffee with free refills.

Nobody drank the coffee at this place.  Nobody but overnight truckers and drunks and this handsome fella with more looks than good horse sense apparently because the coffee was three-cents pricier down the block, but ten times as good.

But that’s what he got, every damn time.  And because it came with refills, she always stopped by his seat on her rounds to check on the contents.  Busy days, he didn’t stay too long; she got the impression maybe he worried about being a nuisance.  But slow days, he would linger for a good long while. Oh he was nice enough, not forward or grabby like some guys could get, but flirty enough to make her blush.  He’d chat a little, about the weather or the ball game or something that made the news.  Charming and pleasant, though she found herself getting a little self-conscious now and then as she helped other customers, like she could feel him keeping his eyes on her.  Now, normally, that might’ve made her skin crawl, but something about him doing that only made her flush a little.  A couple of times, she even caught him looking and he just smiled sheepishly and went back to his coffee.

He’d chat up the older gals, too. And they positively adored him.  Especially the few times he brought in his blond buddy.  Kid was skinny as a rail, but had a face just as handsome and she wondered if there might’ve been something in the water where those two grew up.  The blond guy, Steve apparently, and the brunet, whom she eventually learned was named Bucky of all things, would sit across from each other in a booth, still in her section.  Steve couldn’t have any coffee on account of a heart condition, and really that was probably for the best in this case, but Bucky still ordered a cup.  Sadly, there was an order mix-up that afternoon and the kitchen found itself with an extra tuna melt, which somehow ended up on the table between in front of the blond as he sketched in his little notebook.  And if she thought he was surprised and delighted, the look on Bucky’s face could’ve knocked her right over.

Of course, after that the old gals would rib her on the regular. “Oh, here comes your boyfriend, sweetie!”  “That handsome fella is gaga over you!”  One time, Helena even slapped her hip and smirked “Put a little more wiggle in that walk and you’ll have him drooling right into his coffee cup.”  It only made her blush at first, but with enough teasing and enough of him smiling at her with that devilishly handsome grin of his, she eventually had enough.

It took her three rounds of her section to screw up the courage to say something to him.  She wasn’t real used to talking to customers in anything but a pleasant, professional tone, and talking to people personally was never her strong suit anyway.  Still, she found herself just having to know what was going on with this guy.  So, when she noticed his coffee cup nearing empty, she walked over with the pot in hand and started to pour, unable to meet his eyes.

“I gotta ask ya, buddy,” she smiled slightly.  “Why the hell do you keep comin in here?  The coffee just ain’t that good.”

He snorted out a laugh, hiding it behind the back of his hand like he knew it wasn’t polite.  “You’re right, honey.  It really ain’t.”

“Then why,” she plied, straightening back up to watch that sly grin spread across his face.  And for the first time, as he leaned his elbows on the table and leaned in toward her, she realized exactly what it had meant this whole time.

“Ya ever think, maybe I been comin in here just ta get a gander at you, darlin,” he chuckled.

She gaped at him a moment.  “I… well…”

“Damn, you are so cute.”  His chuckled became a full on laugh, lighting up his already beautiful eyes.  “And sweet, too.  S’why I never need any sugar for my cuppa tar.”

“But the coffee,” she managed to squeak out, which only made him laugh again.

“It’s the cheapest thing on the menu, and I been savin up,” he beamed.

“For… for what,” she shook her head, confused.

At this, he got a little sheepish again, and the red that brightened his cheeks still somehow managed to seem handsome.  “Well, I was thinkin’a askin ya out, but I wanted to make sure I could take ya someplace real nice before I even asked… except…”

The look of disappointment and sadness on his face only served to deepen her confusion.  “Except what?”

“My number came up, sweetheart,” he shrugged, but tried to look light-hearted again.  “And I didn’t wanna take ya out only to have to disappear on ya later.”

She stared at him for a moment, knowing exactly what he meant and what it meant for him.  Leaning down again, she pressed her hand over his and gave it a gentle squeeze until his eyes met hers and she smiled.  “Take me out anywhere you like, just so long as it has better coffee.”

And the grin he gave her was brighter than the noonday sun.

Fast forward several decades and quite a few wars and police actions, and Bucky’s sitting at the kitchen counter one morning with a steaming cup of motor oil pretending it’s coffee as Sam scrunches his nose.

“I know the future is bright and scary,” Wilson frowns, sipping from his own cup, from an entirely different coffee machine that he insisted upon whenever he realized just how terrible Bucky’s taste is.  “But we have much better coffee nowadays.  You ever considered switching from that swill to something halfway decent?”

Bucky gives him a hard look across the counter, raising an eyebrow and his cup.  “Yeah, I considered it.”

And he leaves it at that, though Sam can see the wistful way the corners of his mouth turn up as the smell hits his nose before he takes a sip from the mug.  Wilson may not know everything, but he knows a fond memory playing out in the hard lines of a soldier’s face, no matter how old and world-weary they are.  He never says another thing about it.